10/19/2015 Gesture ­ Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Gesture 1/7

Military air marshallers use handand body gestures to direct flightoperations aboard aircraft carriers.

GestureFrom Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

For gestures in computing, see Gesture recognition. For other uses, see Gestures (disambiguation)."Gestures" redirects here. For the rock group, see The Gestures.

A gesture is a form of non­verbal communication or non­vocal communication in which visible bodily actionscommunicate particular messages, either in place of, or in conjunction with, speech. Gestures include movement ofthe hands, face, or other parts of the body. Gestures differ from physical non­verbal communication that does notcommunicate specific messages, such as purely expressive displays, proxemics, or displays of joint attention.[1]Gestures allow individuals to communicate a variety of feelings and thoughts, from contempt and hostility toapproval and affection, often together with body language in addition to words when they speak.

Gesture processing takes place in areas of the brain such as Broca's and Wernicke's areas, which are used by speechand sign language.[2] In fact, language is thought by some scholars to have evolved in Homo sapiens from an earliersystem consisting of manual gestures.[3] The theory that language evolved from manual gestures, termed GesturalTheory, dates back to the work of 18th­century philosopher and priest Abbé de Condillac, and has been revived bycontemporary anthropologist Gordon W. Hewes, in 1973, as part of a discussion on the origin of language.[4]

Contents

1 Study on gestures2 Categories of gestures3 Social significance4 Neurology5 Electronic interface6 See also7 References8 Further reading9 External links

10/19/2015 Gesture ­ Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Gesture 2/7

Pointing at another person with anextended finger is considered rude in manycultures.

Study on gestures

Gestures have been studied throughout the centuries from different view points.[5] During the Roman Empire, Quintilian studied in his InstitutionOratoria how gesture may be used in rhetorical discourse. Another broad study of gesture was published by John Bulwer in 1644. Bulwer analyzeddozens of gestures and provided a guide on how to use gestures to increase eloquence and clarity for public speaking.[6] Andrea De Jorio published anextensive account of gestural expression in 1832.[7]

Categories of gestures

Main article: List of gestures

Although the scientific study of gesture is still in its infancy, some broad categories of gestures have beenidentified by researchers. The most familiar are the so­called emblems or quotable gestures. These areconventional, culture­specific gestures that can be used as replacement for words, such as the handwaveused in the US for "hello" and "goodbye". A single emblematic gesture can have a very differentsignificance in different cultural contexts, ranging from complimentary to highly offensive[8] The page Listof gestures discusses emblematic gestures made with one hand, two hands, hand and other body parts, andbody and facial gestures.

Another broad category of gestures comprises those gestures used spontaneously when we speak. Thesegestures are closely coordinated with speech. The so­called beat gestures are used in conjunction withspeech and keep time with the rhythm of speech to emphasize certain words or phrases. These types ofgestures are integrally connected to speech and thought processes.[9]

Other spontaneous gestures used during speech production known as iconic gestures are more full ofcontent, and may echo, or elaborate, the meaning of the co­occurring speech. They depict aspects of spatialimages, actions, people, or objects.[10] For example, a gesture that depicts the act of throwing may besynchronous with the utterance, "He threw the ball right into the window."[9] Such gestures that are usedalong with speech tend to be universal. For example, one describing that he/she is feeling cold due to a lackof proper clothing and/or a cold weather can accompany his/her verbal description with a visual one. Thiscan be achieved through various gestures such as by demonstrating a shiver and/or by rubbing the hands

10/19/2015 Gesture ­ Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Gesture 3/7

together. In such cases, the language or verbal description of the person does not necessarily need to be understood as someone could at least take a hintat what's being communicated through the observation and interpretation of body language which serves as a gesture equivalent in meaning to what'sbeing said through communicative speech.

Studies affirm a strong link between gesture typology and language development. Young children under the age of two seem to rely on pointing gesturesto refer to objects that they do not know the names of. Once the words are learned, they eschewed those referential (pointing) gestures. One would thinkthat the use of gesture would decrease as the child develops spoken language, but results reveal that gesture frequency increased as speaking frequencyincreased with age. There is however a change in gesture typology at different ages, suggesting a connection between gestures and languagedevelopment. Children most often use pointing and adults rely more on iconic and beat gestures. As children begin producing sentence­like utterances,they also begin producing new kinds of gestures that adults use when speaking (iconics and beats). Evidence of this systematic organization of gesture isindicative of its association to language development.[10]

Gestural languages such as American Sign Language and its regional siblings operate as complete natural languages that are gestural in modality. Theyshould not be confused with finger spelling, in which a set of emblematic gestures are used to represent a written alphabet. American sign language isdifferent from gesturing in that concepts are modeled by certain hand motions or expressions and has a specific established structure while gesturing ismore malleable and has no specific structure rather it supplements speech. We should note, that before an established sign language was created inNicaragua after the 1970s, deaf communities would use "home signs" in order to communicate with each other. These home signs were not part of aunified language but were still used as familiar motions and expressions used within their family—still closely related to language rather than gestureswith no specific structure.[11] This is similar to what has been observed in the gestural actions of chimpanzees. Gestures are used by these animals inplace of verbal language, which is restricted in animals due to their lacking certain physiological and articulatory abilities that humans have for speech.Corballis (2009) asserts that "our hominin ancestors were better pre­adapted to acquire language­like competence using manual gestures than usingvocal sounds."[12] This leads to a debate about whether humans, too, looked to gestures first as their modality of language in the early existence of thespecies. The function of gestures may have been a significant player in the evolution of language.

Social significance

Gestures, commonly referred to as “body language,” play an important role in industry. Proper body language etiquette in business dealings can becrucial for success. However, gestures can have different meanings according to the country in which they are expressed. In an age of global business,diplomatic cultural sensitivity has become a necessity. Gestures that we take as innocent may be seen by someone else as deeply insulting.[13] Thefollowing gestures are examples of proper etiquette with respect to different countries’ customs on salutations: In the United States, “a firm handshake,accompanied by direct eye contact, is the standard greeting. Direct eye contact in both social and business situations is very important.” In the People’sRepublic of China, “the Western custom of shaking a person's hand upon introduction has become widespread throughout the country. However,oftentimes a nod of the head or a slight bow will suffice.” In Japan, “the act of presenting business cards is very important. When presenting, one holdsthe business card with both hands, grasping it between the thumbs and forefingers. The presentation is to be accompanied by a slight bow. The print on

10/19/2015 Gesture ­ Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Gesture 4/7

Vitarka mudra, Tarim Basin, 9thcentury.

the card should point towards the person to which one is giving the card.” In Germany, “it is impolite to shake someone's hand with your other hand inyour pocket. This is seen as a sign of disrespect” In France, “a light, quick handshake is common. To offer a strong, pumping handshake would beconsidered uncultured. When one enters a room, be sure to greet each person present. A woman in France will offer her hand first.”[14]

Gestures are also a means to initiate a mating ritual. This may include elaborate dances and other movements.Gestures play a major role in many aspects of human life. Gesturing is probably universal; there has been no reportof a community that does not gesture. Gestures are a crucial part of everyday conversation such as chatting,describing a route, negotiating prices on a market; they are ubiquitous. Additionally, when people use gestures, thereis a certain shared background knowledge. We use similar gestures when talking about a specific action such as howwe gesture the idea of drinking out of a cup. When an individual makes a gesture, another person can understandbecause of recognition of the actions/shapes.[15] Gestures have been documented in the arts such as in Greek vasepaintings, Indian Miniatures or European paintings.

Gestures play a central role in religious or spiritual rituals such as the Christian sign of the cross. In Hinduism andBuddhism, a mudra (Sanskrit, literally "seal") is a symbolic gesture made with the hand or fingers. Each mudra hasa specific meaning, playing a central role in Hindu and Buddhist iconography. An example is the Vitarka mudra, thegesture of discussion and transmission of Buddhist teaching. It is done by joining the tips of the thumb and the indextogether, while keeping the other fingers straight.

Neurology

Gestures are processed in the same areas of the brain as speech and sign language such as the left inferior frontalgyrus (Broca's area) and the posterior middle temporal gyrus, posterior superior temporal sulcus and superior temporal gyrus (Wernicke's area).[2] It hasbeen suggested that these parts of the brain originally supported the pairing of gesture and meaning and then were adapted in human evolution "for thecomparable pairing of sound and meaning as voluntary control over the vocal apparatus was established and spoken language evolved".[2] As a result, itunderlies both symbolic gesture and spoken language in the present human brain. Their common neurological basis also supports the idea that symbolicgesture and spoken language are two parts of a single fundamental semiotic system that underlies human discourse.[9] The linkage of hand and bodygestures in conjunction with speech is further revealed by the nature of gesture use in blind individuals during conversation. This phenomenon uncoversa function of gesture that goes beyond portraying communicative content of language and extends David McNeill's view of the gesture­speech system.This suggests that gesture and speech work tightly together, and a disruption of one (speech or gesture) will cause a problem in the other. Studies havefound strong evidence that speech and gesture are innately linked in the brain and work in an efficiently wired and choreographed system. McNeill'sview of this linkage in the brain is just one of three currently up for debate; the others declaring gesture to be a "support system" of spoken language or aphysical mechanism for lexical retrieval.[16]

10/19/2015 Gesture ­ Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Gesture 5/7

Because of this connection of co­speech gestures—a form of manual action—in language in the brain, Roel Willems and Peter Hagoort conclude thatboth gestures and language contribute to the understanding and decoding of a speaker's encoded message. Willems and Hagoort's research suggest that"processing evoked by gestures is qualitatively similar to that of words at the level of semantic processing." This conclusion is supported throughfindings from experiments by Skipper where the use of gestures led to "a division of labor between areas related to language or action (Broca's area andpremotor/primary motor cortex respectively)." The use of gestures in combination with speech allowed the brain to decrease the need for "semanticcontrol." Because gestures aided in understanding the relayed message, there was not as great a need for semantic selection or control that wouldotherwise be required of the listener through Broca's area. Gestures are a way to represent the thoughts of an individual, which are prompted in workingmemory. The results of an experiment revealed that adults have increased accuracy when they used pointing gestures as opposed to simply counting intheir heads (without the use of pointing gestures)[15] Furthermore, the results of a study conducted by Marstaller and Burianová suggest that the use ofgestures affect working memory. The researchers found that those with low capacity of working memory who were able to use gestures actually recalledmore terms than those with low capacity who were not able to use gestures.[17]

Although there is an obvious connection in the aid of gestures in understanding a message, "the understanding of gestures is not the same asunderstanding spoken language." These two functions work together and gestures help facilitate understanding, but they only "partly drive the neurallanguage system."[18]

Electronic interface

Main article: Gesture recognition

The movement of gestures can be used to interact with technology like computers, using touch or multi­touch popularised by the iPhone, physicalmovement detection and visual motion capture, used in video game consoles.

See also

ChironomiaGrowth pointHaptic communicationKinesicsList of gesturesMusical gesturePosture (psychology)Rock, Paper, Scissors, a game played with hand gesturesSign language

10/19/2015 Gesture ­ Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Gesture 6/7

TauntOransSaluteEnactment effect

References1. Kendon, Adam. (2004) Gesture: Visible Action as Utterance. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press. ISBN 0­521­83525­92. Xu J, Gannon PJ, Emmorey K, Smith JF, Braun AR. (2009). Symbolic gestures and spoken language are processed by a common neural system.

(http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC2779203/pdf/pnas.0909197106.pdf) Proc Natl Acad Sci U S A. 106:20664–20669. doi:10.1073/pnas.0909197106(https://dx.doi.org/10.1073%2Fpnas.0909197106) PMID 19923436

3. Corballis, Michael (January–February 2010). "The gestural origins of language". WIREs Cognitive Science 1.4. Corballis, Michael. (January/February 2010). "The gestural origins of language." © 2009 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd. WIREs Cogn Sci 2010 1 2–75. Kendon, A (1982). "The study of gesture: Some observations on its history". Recherches Sémiotiques/Semiotic Inquiry 2 (1): 45–62.6. Bulwer, J (1644). Chirologia: or the Naturall Language of the Hand. London.7. de Jorio, A (1832/2002). Gesture in Naples and Gesture in Classical Antiquity. Indiana University Press. ISBN 0­253­21506­4. Check date values in: |date=

(help)8. Morris, Desmond, Collett, Peter, Marsh, Peter, O'Shaughnessy, Marie. 1979. Gestures, their origins and distribution. London. Cape9. McNeill (1992). Hand and Mind. Chicago: University of Chicago Press10. Mayberry, Rachel I. (December 2000). "Gesture Reflects Language Development: Evidence from Bilingual Children". Current Directions in Psychological Science

9 (6): 192–196. doi:10.1111/1467­8721.00092. JSTOR 20182668.11. Fernandez, Eva M.; Helen Smith Cairns (2011). Fundamentals of Psycholinguistics. Wiley­Blackwell. p. 77. ISBN 9781405191470.12. Corballis, M. C. (2010), The gestural origins of language. WIREs Cogn Sci, 1: 2–7. doi: 10.1002/wcs.213. Axtell, R. (1993). Do's and taboos around the world. (3rd ed., p. 116). Wiley. Retrieved from

http://www.sheltonstate.edu/Uploads/files/faculty/Angela%20Gibson/Sph%20106/taboos0001.pdf14. Axtell, R. (1993). Worldsmart: Gestures around the world. World Smart Resource Center, Retrieved from

http://www.globalbusinessleadership.com/gestures_overview.asp15. VASC, Dermina, and Thea IONESCU. "Embodying Cognition: Gestures And Their Role In The Development Of Thinking." Cognitie, Creier,

Comportament/Cognition, Brain, Behavior 17.2 (2013): 149­150. Academic Search Complete. Web.16. Iverson, Jana M.; Esther Thelen (2005). "Hand, Mouth and Brain" (PDF). Journal of Consciousness Studies. Retrieved 1 October 2013.17. Marstaller, Lars and Hana Burianová. "Individual differences in the gesture effect on working memory."Psychonomic Society 20 (2013): 496­500. Academic

Search Complete. Web.18. Willems, Roel M., and Peter Hagoort. "Neural Evidence for the Interplay between Language, Gesture, and Action: A Review." Brain and Language 101.3 (2007):

1,4­6. Print.

Further reading

10/19/2015 Gesture ­ Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Gesture 7/7

Look up gesture inWiktionary, the freedictionary.

Wikimedia Commons hasmedia related to gestures.

Wikivoyage has a travelguide for gestures.

Bulwer, J (1644). Chirologia: or the Naturall Language of the Hand.Gänshirt, Christian (2007): Gestures, in: Tools for Ideas. An Introduction to Architectural Design. Basel, Boston, Berlin: Birkhäuser, ISBN 978­3­7643­7577­5, pp. 105­112Goldin­Meadow, S (2003). Hearing gesture: How our hands help us think. Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press. ISBN 0­674­01837­0.Kendon, A (2004). Gesture: Visible Action as Utterance. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press. ISBN 0­521­54293­6.Kita, S (2003). Pointing: Where Language, Culture and Cognition Meet. Lawrence Erlbaum Associates. ISBN 0­8058­4014­1.McNeill, D (2005). Gesture and Thought. Chicago: University of Chicago Press. ISBN 0­226­51462­5.

External links

International Society for Gesture Studies (http://www.gesturestudies.com) devoted to the study of humangesture

Retrieved from "https://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Gesture&oldid=682149700"

Categories: Gestures

This page was last modified on 21 September 2015, at 21:07.Text is available under the Creative Commons Attribution­ShareAlike License; additional terms mayapply. By using this site, you agree to the Terms of Use and Privacy Policy. Wikipedia® is a registered trademark of the Wikimedia Foundation,Inc., a non­profit organization.